Demystifying CEU Presentations

Tiffany Rafii:

Welcome to The Design Board, a podcast created by the team at UpSpring that focuses on design, development, and everything in between. We invite innovators in our industry and explore topics that support your growth in every way. The Design Board is a proud member of SURROUND, a podcast network from SANDOW Design Group featuring the architecture and design industry's premier shows. Check it out at surroundpodcasts.com.

Today we have Meredith Campbell joining us. Meredith is part of the research and content development team at ThinkLab and host of the design industry's first CEU podcast, The Learning Objective. ThinkLab is the intelligence division of SANDOW Design Group, the parent company of Interior Design Media, Metropolis, and many other design-driven brands in media and beyond.

At ThinkLab, Meredith spent her days researching the world of design to gather meaningful insights for the industry and shares those broadly through research, editorial, and speaking engagements.

Meredith is going to help us demystify the CEU, giving us a 360 degree view on why they are relevant and how to create them. We also have with us today Susan Fernandez, UpSpring's VP of Digital, who guides our clients on CEU development. It's a meeting of the minds. Let's chat through it. Meredith, kick us off with the basics. What is a CEU and why is it relevant?

Meredith Campbell:

Thanks, Tiffany. A CEU stands for continuing education unit. You may have also heard it referred to as CE, continuing education, or really casually in our industry as a lunch and learn. But a CEU is basically the credit that architects and designers need to maintain their professional credentials.

Think of it like you wouldn't want a doctor who hasn't had any continuing education since the '80s to operate on you. In the same way, it's a really powerful way for architects and designers to stay up to date with the things that are changing in our industry. Now, if you're a brand, CEUs are a really powerful way to reach the architecture and design community because it's helping them upskill.

There are multiple ways and formats and accrediting bodies that you can go through to have your CEU approved. We could talk a little bit about the technical details, but the kind of organizations that we most commonly see in our work with clients and in our conversations with architects and designers are AIA, IDCEC, and GBCI, which is a certifying body for both the LEED credential and the WELL credential. Even though there's a ton of them out there and they all have slightly different requirements, the technicalities of them are somewhat similar.

We also like to think of CEUs not just as an educational platform for architects and designers, but if you're a brand, it's a really powerful form of thought leadership. In fact, I like to say it's one of the most interactive forms of thought leadership that your brand can put out there. So we think they're really important.

CEUs sometimes get a bad wrap. If you've sat through a really boring presentation or you've had a bad presenter, a lot of us have been there who have sat on the design side. That's why we are really on this mission to help brands create CEUs and guide them through the process because so much has changed in our industry and thus the CEU kind of has to evolve too.

Tiffany Rafii:

No, absolutely. I know that for many of even our clients who think about going after creating a CEU, it just can seem so overwhelming. There are so many parameters and rules and technicalities involved. Would you help walk us through what that might look like and how someone might even approach getting started on developing one?

Meredith Campbell:

Yeah, you're exactly right, because if you look at all of the different manuals and all the rules and regulations, it does start to feel a little bit daunting. But it's very simply a couple of things for most of these organizations, regardless of which ones you're going through, whether it be IDCEC, AIA, or GBCI like I mentioned before.

They need four learning objectives. They have to have third party credible sources and a bibliography. You can't sell during a CEU. This is something that is really important to note that this really has to be research based. There are various links and formats that you can use. Probably the most common would be what a lot of us think about is the one-hour lunch and learn, but there are a variety of formats beyond that.

It doesn't have to be live. These presentations can also be on demand, which we'll talk a little bit more about some of those fun formats that are coming out. And there are of course specific designations like HSW, which is healthy, safety, and welfare. For IDCEC and AIA, a certain number of hours for participants have to have that really specific designation. That means that 75% of your presentation has to be specific to topics that are related to health safety and welfare.

For GBCI, you kind of have your general credits, but then you also have to have your specialty credits. So there are a few kind of different things that you have to think about when you're doing your topic development, but it doesn't have to feel super daunting. You just really need to know who that audience is that you're going to reach and what those requirements are that are most important to them.

If you're really trying to reach the design audience, then maybe you just start with IDCEC and really get that one under your belt. Maybe you want to extend to more of the architecture audience, more of the kind of sustainability audience. Then you could start to get into AIA, GBCI, and really explore those.

But we encourage people, don't try to get it approved with every single certifying body on the first one. Zone in like you would with anything else as to what your goals are at the end of it, instead of just throwing a CEU out there, which is sometimes the temptation I think is like, let's just get this content out there and see what happens. We like to think about it a little bit more of what are your end goals and then let's look at which of these certifying bodies would be most appropriate depending on what your audience really needs.

Tiffany Rafii:

That totally makes sense. I think honing in on the audience side of things, how do you identify where to start? What type of audience should you be going after? How would a CEU differ if you are going to the architecture community versus your core demographic being designers potentially? How does this impact thought leadership and company growth and development, and how is all of that decided? What questions should they be asking themselves when they're heading down this journey?

Meredith Campbell:

It's a great question. One thing I will start with is that even though going through the process of getting the CEU certified with any of those bodies, more of the kind of technical parts of it, many times the people who are sitting in on your topic may not even need credit for it. Do think about that as well.

Like I mentioned before, we really try to encourage the brands that we work with to think of CEUs as thought leadership. Now, there are architects, designers, and we kind of study what's happening in the design community but also the larger ecosystem around it.

So sometimes you may be working with commercial real estate. We're seeing commercial real estate has more and more influence in certain sectors. We even see facility managers. There are a lot of different parties who have influence over specification and thus are interesting to our brands. Not every single one of these needs CEU credit.

You really have to hone in on of this audience and what's important to them, which of these, obviously, like I said, the organizational bodies, but also what is the product they're selecting? That depends a lot on which sector they're working in.

Even with architects and designers for instance, a designer is tremendously passionate about product. And that's the thing that's kind of different about the A and D community versus some of the other members of the ecosystem. Now, there are certainly designers and architects who go into the facility side or go into the real estate side, so they bring some of that passion with them.

But I would say that this A and D audience is really the trend setters when it comes to product development and they also have a tremendous impact within projects themselves. So if you can make this interesting and relevant to that audience, you're probably going to have the rest of them covered too, is kind of what we tell people just as a rule of thumb.

One of the other things that we've been looking at, because as you mentioned, we're a research firm, so a lot of what we're looking at is from a research lens of what's happening in this ecosystem even bigger than design. We did some persona research. We came out with personas, and there's a ton more on this, but I'll just touch on it on this particular point because I think it's really relevant.

We wanted to know even outside of just the role, whether they're an architect or designer or they're a facility manager or they're in purchasing or they're in commercial real estate, regardless of role or even generation. We talk a lot about millennials or Gen Z wants this or so-and-so wants this. We started to notice some things that were really different about the wants and needs of different personas versus looking at different job titles. Does that make sense?

What we started to realize as we were doing this research is what is that desired blend of human digital, the way they like to receive information, the way they like to maybe self-serve or have something handed to them. Even more so than just some of these job titles or generations or typical demographic information, the persona research that we've looked into has really started to clarify that.

I don't mean to steer us too far off of the CEU, but I do think it's important to note that there are differences just in that preference of how I want to interact with a brand and CEUs being an important part of that too.

Tiffany Rafii:

Yeah. To flip that around, I know I'm going to tap Susan for this, but to flip that around a lot of the identification of what type of CEU to develop and who that's going to hit and how that's going to impact the growth and development of your company goes through that same process of identifying those personas internally. It's who are we trying to reach? How do we want to make an impact on the A and D community? How do we want to inspire and support growth and change and put our effort behind things like sustainability in all of its forms and all of its impact?

Susan, do you want to chime in on how a product manufacturer could develop those personas and really look into diving deep and identifying how to reach the right people?

Susan Fernandez:

Absolutely. That's something we really work on a lot at UpSpring is really identifying these personas and understanding how the very subtle but important differences on how a designer might want to receive information versus an engineer or a facility manager, even just in the way that you would frame up the conversation, the visuals and how you would tell that story, kind of having those nuanced differences.

Meredith, I really liked your comment about how they want to have the CEU delivered or how they want to access it. Can you tell us a little bit about how that's evolving? What are the many ways you could either download or participate in the CEU?

Meredith Campbell:

Yeah, absolutely. Kind of the evolution of the CEU, if you think about back in 2019 and before, not to dwell on the pandemic because I know we've talked about that ad nauseum, but it is an important kind of turning point in some things that we believe really just were accelerated by the pandemic versus necessarily changed only because of that.

But if you think about the way you might get in front of an A and D firm as a brand, it might be a lunch and learn. That was a really common thing if you're in sales is that you would go in over lunchtime. It might have been the only way that you were able to get in front of that firm because they might have said, "We don't do product presentations, but you could come in and do a CEU." It might have been sort of vital for your ability to connect with that particular specifier.

Now, fast-forward to the pandemic and all of a sudden everything went virtual. We were in this world where all of a sudden it wasn't just a break in a designer's day where they could step away from their desk and go grab lunch and sit in your lunch and learn presentation and connect with our local rep. All of a sudden it's just another meeting in their very Zoom fatigued day. A one-hour presentation over Zoom versus a one-hour presentation over lunch in a nice comfortable chair is a very different thing.

That's one shift. It's just time. The way that we view time became very different. Now, if you think about how things are now and how things are evolving, our research really points to the future being hybrid, which I know we've all heard this word ad nauseum too. What I mean by that is we started asking firms at the very beginning of the pandemic, what are your office policies going to be going forward? Consistently, over the last couple of years, 75% have said that they will be somewhere on the hybrid spectrum just for their office policies.

You can start to see what that snowball effect is of how you'll be able to reach them. Do we think the in-person CEU is going away completely? Absolutely not. It's still a very powerful tool to connect in person. People love that one-on-one relationship with their local rep, but what they got a taste of during the pandemic was all of a sudden I have access to all these experts within the organization. I have access to a CEU that's happening in California, and I'm not just limited to my local expertise, if you will. All of a sudden I have this whole world of options.

And so we're really looking at from relationships as currency, which relationships will always be important, hear me clearly on that, to thought leadership as currency. All of a sudden if my time is limited, if I'm jumping on a Zoom call with you, I'm not just going to sit and have lunch with you over a Zoom call. All of a sudden, I need to know that you can tell me something that I will be really helped by, that I'll be impacted by.

We like to say that many times you're kind of swimming in this sea of information, but you're really starved for insights. So these insights have become so important. Again, you've heard me say several times now that really thought leadership can be your lead in.

One of the stats that we really liked from LinkedIn and Edelman, they did a B2B buyer research around thought leadership, and they said that 71% of B2B decision makers said that less than half of the thought leadership that they consume gives them valuable insights, less than half. Even though we know our industry is unique, we still like to look at some of those more general broad things that are happening in the B2B world because we do think those have a lot of implication for our industry.

With all of those kind of changes and evolutions in this world around us, how does that impact CEUs, back to your question, Susan, and kind of these new formats? We really think about not only the mode of delivery, but also your channels for delivery.

There's also McKinsey research again outside of our industry, but we think it's really relevant, that this rule of thirds has emerged, that customers kind of employ this roughly even mix of traditional sales, which would be kind of that in-person like I mentioned before, remote, which would be more of your video calls, a phone call, whatever the case may be, and these self-serve more digital interactions. But that's really kind of become the norm is engaging with brands in these kind of rule of thirds ways.

All to say that even though the in-person live CEU won't go away, we see that there is a lot more opportunity for on demand content to kind of complete the ecosystem. For instance, we're on a podcast right now. Your listeners may be multitasking while they're listening to us. They may be out on a walk. They may be commuting into their office on one of the days that they do happen to be in the office.

We kind of walking the talk have created a podcast CEU, just as an example of a format. That was one of the things, Tiffany, you mentioned, I host a podcast CEU. And the whole idea there was that why not meet people where they are? If they're not sitting at their desk and they're not going to the in-person lunch and learn, there are other ways that they could interact with the content.

Now, a lot of our brands that we work with still want a traditional CEU, but maybe that traditional CEU has a QR code that links you to the podcast so that you could listen to a 30-minute episode with some experts who are talking about the topics. So the research comes to life in that way.

Or maybe it's more of a panel discussion. Like I mentioned before, that even though you love your local rep, they may not be the best person in the company to talk about sustainability. So all of a sudden when you're using a virtual format, you can bring in some of those people not only within your own organization that are really thought leaders, but also pair it with people from outside of your organization because designers love to hear from other designers on what they're doing as well. So you just get this richer amount of content.

But again, being able to link the on demand with that in-person is really important. And part of the kind of topical discussion that we hear a lot from designers is when you are thinking about your topic, one of the things that I've heard a lot from designers in our focus groups and research is we need to know the technical content, but I'm not necessarily going to take a break in my day to listen to a CEU that's hyper-technical. I'm going to go to your website and I'm going to find that when I need it. Because for all of us, it's really difficult to retain that much information in one sitting.

And so your technical content, I would really encourage brands to think about that more on demand in the delivery so that a designer could go and read an article or maybe listen to a podcast or access that in a way that may not even be a CEU. That might not even be the right topic for a CEU. Even though it matters to you and designers need to know it to resist that temptation to make that into a CEU, it might be better served.

Susan Fernandez:

Meredith, that's a great lead in to a question I've been wondering about, and that is how storytelling impacts CEUs. We're talking about that fine line between delivering valuable content and not overwhelming the audience with so much technical information that they can't really do anything with it.

I guess my question really is kind of like what is this almost storytelling slash entertainment aspect because we need to keep people involved and engaged versus the technical content that you need to deliver as well. How do you balance that?

Meredith Campbell:

That's a great question, Susan. One of the things that I really like to encourage brands to think about first and foremost is instead of starting with what do we as a brand want to talk about? Because I think that's the way we used to think about CEUs is like, what's our next product launch? What's the thing that's really important here? Flip that a little bit, and think about what is it that my audience really is struggling with right now? What do they want to hear? And really start with an empathetic point of view around it.

One of our top podcasts is on creative burnout. We were a little bit surprised by this because that's not the technical content, but it's something that is on the hearts and minds of designers. And so they're going to take a break to listen to that over listening to something that is hyper-technical. Not to say they don't also need that, but if you are able to have a more general topic, if you're not going for the health, safety, welfare or the specific LEED or WELL designations that I mentioned before, if you are in more of that general category, IDCEC and AIA are fairly reasonable about what they'll approve.

It gives you a little bit of flexibility. It doesn't have to be this hyper-technical. It does need to be rooted in research and it does need to have those sources and the bibliography. We can't just say anything certainly, but I think that sometimes it's surprising to brands to learn that they can talk about things that are professional development topics or even personal development topics like burnout and how to design against burnout because those affect the practice of interior design and architecture. Those affect the employees of interior design and architecture.

Back to some of that kind of general research too, Susan, even outside of our industry, that same study that I mentioned from Edelman and LinkedIn about B2B thought leadership, they said that 81% of people preferred thought leadership that offered provocative ideas that challenge their assumptions regarding a topic versus validating their current thinking. So that's a huge percentage of the audience that really wants to be challenged.

I believe this is true of the A and D community too. They're incredibly curious. That's one of the things that I think we all love about designers so much is how curious they are, what sponges they are for knowledge. They have to know so much in their jobs. They have to be experts on so many products and so many processes and different things.

Another one, 71% consume thought leadership to stimulate new thinking and generate new ideas for their organizations. And then 68% actually consume thought leadership to gain insights into future trends that are going to impact their business and their organizations. That's a big one is what are some things we should be looking at towards the future? We hear that a lot.

Some of this is coming from research as well. Whenever we're asking the design community, what are you tired of hearing about? What do you need more of? What's oversaturated? And kind of keeping a almost competitive lens as to what your competition's talking about, because you don't want to just be out there in a sea of sameness.

If you are talking about a topic that's hyper-saturated, we recommend that you really find that little hook that's going to provoke those ideas, challenge their assumptions, stimulate that new thinking, and also maybe even look to the future a bit when you're looking at that.

Those are just some places to start. Again, if you're in the more general range within your CEU certification, if you're in that HSW or LEED or WELL specific, that you're a little bit more dictated on what you can talk about, you can certainly still apply this thinking there as well, but you just have to make sure you're meeting those more stringent requirements.

Tiffany Rafii:

That's super helpful. I think one thing that is so interesting to me is the fact that these CEOs are now on demand, because I think the opportunity for reach is so much greater. You don't need a person to deliver the CEU every time.

And so in this on demand format, what are the best ways we can leverage these CEUs to connect with our audiences? And how do we even go about? We've gone through the entire exercise, we've built the CEU, and now how are we using it to connect with our audience in a really productive way?

Meredith Campbell:

Yeah. I think there's a couple of ways you can do this. Number one, you can promote it through your own channels certainly. If you don't have a tab on your website that's learning, that's kind of, I say easy, but that's sort of an obvious place to start so that you can have all of that content readily available.

I also would maybe encourage brands to think about a way that even if someone's consuming something on demand, but they're like, "Ooh, I love this topic, I would love to bring this to our firm," make it easy for them to connect with the local person so that connection can happen as well.

You can certainly promote it there, promote it through your own channels just like you would anything else. But you can also go through other organizations. A lot of the industry organizations or the certifying bodies or I know there's sites like AEC Daily or CEU Events or even our sister company Metropolis has been doing these CEU fests, and these are kind of virtual events that you can find CEUs on demand, or you can go through more curated CEU content that way through these more almost aggregators of CEUs where they're taking CEUs from multiple brands. So then you can begin to filter and sort what's important to you.

As a brand, evaluate that. What are the things that we just want someone to be able to discover on their own in our website or through our local teams, or what are the things that we really want to be found by being on some of these other kind of aggregators or events so that we can really amplify our voice, amplify our thought leadership?

These CEUs are, like you said, a sizable investment. Even if you're doing it in-house yourself, there's still a lot of time that goes into it because they are research projects essentially. And so really thinking about maximizing that reach versus just creating this one body of information, which is fine, start there, but versus just creating this one body of information that is only used as a singular tool. I think that's a really big shift in the way that we're looking at things in our more interconnected digital world.

Tiffany Rafii:

One question we get a lot is that these CEUs are a huge investment, a time investment and monetary investment. Are they worth it? That's the question we get a lot, but I think even beyond them being worth it, how long do they live for? What is their lifespan? How often, how many do you need to be developing? How much energy and effort needs to go behind staying relevant in this area?

Meredith Campbell:

It's such a good question, Tiffany, and I think that it's prudent of brands to ask this question. We get it too. Everyone wants to know the ROI. What is the ROI? What is the ROI? I would say really simply, a CEU isn't a silver bullet, it's a springboard. You have to think about it in that way that it is really your entry into being able to have your sales reps seen as a resource.

If you're a marketing team, again, it's kind of amplifying some of your thought leadership and amplifying your subject matter experts. If you're in training or you're in sales enablement, this is really about making sure that the people who are delivering this CEU really are properly trained, because that's a mistake I see a lot of brands make is that they focus just on the content of the CEU, but then the training part, really the wheels fall off the bus.

Your content is only as good as your weakest presenter. It's not an easy thing. Not everyone is just a phenomenal presenter. And so you really have to think about a lot of those things.

Now, what I would say to are CEUs worth it, one of the things that we've found in our research, and we quote this statistic quite a bit because I think it is sort of staggering, is that the average designer has 26 times the specification power that the average American has buying power. Now, that number can be up to 111 times that for the Interior Design Giants of Design, which as you know is like the Fortune 500 of the design industry.

This influence of the A and D community cannot be ignored, not only like I said, for product design, but also their decision making power in projects. Even if you maybe aren't all in on calling on the A and D community, there are some manufacturers who maybe focus their efforts other places, the influence of this community is really hard to ignore.

CEUs become a really powerful way to reach this extremely busy, highly influential audience. And some firms won't step away to see a product presentation. That's not even a way you can get in front of them, but they will step away to learn something that's going to help their business, help their professional development, something that they see worthwhile there.

One of the other really interesting things, even during the height of the pandemic, this was shocking to me, about half of all of the A and D firms that we surveyed said that their consumption of CEUs was still increasing. And they were really happy with this virtual option like I mentioned before, which is great because it does again, give you access to more experts to connect with them in addition to just your local rep.

So like I said, it really is a springboard. I would say as you're developing a CEU, number one, content is critical. We've talked about that. You have to make sure that your topic is timely, it's something that your audience really wants to hear about. Almost thinking about it from a competitive lens, like I mentioned before, what are the pieces of the conversation that aren't being had that we need to make sure to talk about?

Rethinking the format. We've talked about some of the different formats that are available. Making sure that delivery and the people who are giving the CEU feel properly trained and prepared. There are certainly a lot of things we recommend there.

And then finally, one thing that's really important, and we haven't talked about this yet, but it's kind of sales one-on-one is don't forget the follow-up. Don't just give the CEU and then be done. If you are in sales, you can give a short kind of commercial at the end of your CEU that actually speaks to your product or service. You can break that rule of you can't talk about your product, you can't talk about your brand. At the very end after the formal part of the CEU, you can do that.

Or if you're in marketing, and this is more virtual on demand, make sure you collect those quiz takers because for on demand content, you do have to have a quiz. Make sure you're using those emails as a lead distribution list. Now, use them responsibly of course, but this gives you the perfect opportunity to capture this audience so exactly who's taking this.

And then once you know that, whether you're in sales and doing this in person or you're in marketing and this is more on demand, then all of a sudden you can start to connect with your audience, which is what we all want ultimately. That's what we all want out of a CEU.

I almost like to say it's kind of like the Amazon, if you like this, you might also like that. If this is something that really stimulated something in this audience, maybe there's a follow-up that you send them that's an article or there's a book or there's something that you create as a brand that kind of is a continuous campaign after this is over. I think a lot of people don't think about that second step, but just don't forget that it's a really effective way to connect with your audience afterwards too.

Those would kind of be the things that I would say. Yes, a CEU is a sizable investment, whether you're hiring somebody like us who are consultants who create CEUs on your behalf or you're doing it yourself in house, which many do, there's also the hours to consider and that expertise and the research that goes into it. So it shouldn't be taken lightly. But at the same time, I don't think that it's anything that brands should be intimidated by because you can totally do this, but just think about these things during the development of it.

Susan Fernandez:

Meredith, I really, really liked that idea of following up. It made me think about also marketing this CEU and using maybe snippets from the CEU videos, which do really well on LinkedIn. Are there other ways that you see firms using marketing to promote their CEUs?

Meredith Campbell:

Yeah, that's a good question. I think I do see if it's applicable and there's a product that launches or a service or there's something that's happening within their brand, maybe there's something around neurodiversity or there's something about a new product that's super sustainable, I do see them oftentimes offering that CEU in conjunction with that launch. I'm kind of talking out of both sides of my mouth that I've talked that it shouldn't be about product, but it's okay if your product or service rather is the natural solution to something that the CEU sparks. That is okay.

I would be careful that it's not a thinly veiled marketing piece. I hear that a lot from designers that they can smell a thinly veiled marketing piece a mile away, but it's okay if this happens in conjunction with a marquee product launch or something really cutting edge that you're doing and that CEU helps them understand why this matters. I know that's not a specific marketing campaign, but I do see some brands that do a really good job kind of coupling those together.

Many times that's when they will come to us is because there's been a major branding shift or there's been a major product launch, or they're doing something that's really shifting thinking in our industry and they need to do more than just launch a product. They need to tell the why. And a CEU is a phenomenal platform to tell your why.

Tiffany Rafii:

One thing I also love about this on demand option for the CEU is that unlike other pieces of content, your audience actually needs this. They need these CEUs to get the credits that they're looking for. And so if you create some compelling content or you've really generated a CEU that's super relevant and interesting, you're going to see that there will be a lot of pass through of that CEU.

It's almost like something going viral in our A and D world, the opportunity for that CEU to sort of breathe and live on its own. It'll be amongst peers and give you the opportunity to continue drumming up awareness for what you believe in, your capabilities, and ultimately your brand on an ongoing basis, which is incredibly interesting and a really impactful way to get your message across.

I think the way these because has have evolved, especially in the formats, the podcasts are really an incredible way to do that and the on-demand digital ways that they're received have really made a difference. We hear that from the designers all the time that it's just really been a game changer for them.

Meredith Campbell:

Yeah, absolutely. There's so many different things to think about. It's not just a PowerPoint full of bullet points anymore. Or at least you might be missing some opportunity if it is. That's okay, if that's where you are today. That's totally okay, but you can start to evolve this. To your point, Tiffany, as your strategy and as your brand is evolving, you can use those really good foundational basics to shift your mindset around CEUs.

I think that's what I'm excited about our conversation today is just that this is really a mindset shift in our industry because CEUs did, like I said, in a lot of ways, kind of have a bad rap because there had been so many bad ones that designers had sat through. I've been on both sides of the coin. I've been a designer sitting through them, I've been a salesperson delivering them, and now I'm on the research side helping develop them. And so I feel empathy for every single side of the process.

And so I just think that the opportunity is huge because of some of these shifts that have happened. I think that designers need to know more now than ever, and how can we really help them sift through this overwhelming world of information to find those rich insights that are going to help them do their job better, that are going to help you as a brand, make better connections to your people, to your services, to your product, those types of things.

I think that it's a very sunny view ahead as I'm looking at what thought leadership in the form of CEUs can take. I'm really excited that we got to have this conversation about them.

Tiffany Rafii:

We see this with every interaction that we have. The brands that are prioritizing thought leadership in all of its forms are the brands that are the most relevant. This is just one of many ways to make that impact and definitely one that we recommend.

Meredith, thank you so much for your time today. Is there anything else that you feel like our audience should know?

Meredith Campbell:

I would invite your audience if they are in sales, if they're in marketing, if they're in sales enablement, we're trying to kind of walk the talk, so we've created some on-demand learning, and we have a course on CEUs actually. It's some of what we've talked about today, but even a deeper dive. And this course is completely free, so if anyone in your audience wants to dive a little bit deeper into this conversation, you can find those at sandowdesigngroup.teachable.com, and there's a section for brands. You can find that there and just kind of upskill yourself.

Even if maybe you're a veteran who has been delivering, creating CEUs for years, again, if you're just trying to brush up on where things are now, how things might look in the future, we've created this content for you, again, free of charge.

Tiffany Rafii:

That's great. Thank you so much. What an incredible resource. Thank you.

Susan Fernandez:

Thank you, Meredith.

Meredith Campbell:

Thank you guys.

Tiffany Rafii:

Thank you so much for listening in with us today. We hope you leave inspired by the ideas in today's episode. For more, follow UpSpring on LinkedIn and Instagram. And don't forget to check out the amazing lineup of shows brought to you by the SURROUND podcast network at surroundpodcasts.com.